steve handelsman joins us now live from capitol hill with the special treatment congress gave to the retired general today. >> reporter: this is the big set of hearings, hi, jim, from the hill tonight. republicans are still charging that somebody played politics with what the public was told about benghazi. but petraeus testified that langly didn't do that. former cia director david petraeus kept out of sight until he got home. lawmakers had cleared the way for him to get to the closed-door hearing without walking through halls. a favorite of the general who apologized to lawmakers for his affair. petraeus testified the cia figured immediately it was al qaeda that attacked the sufficient consulate in benghazi, killing the u.s. ambassador and three others. how the cia with an eye on libya missed the threat is still under investigation. but petraeus' testimony helped. >> it added to our ability to make judgments about what is clearly a failure of intelligence. >> reporter: it did not end the fight over u.n. ambassador susan rice, who, five days after the attack, denied it was al qaeda.